Analysis of ASR Clogging Investigations at Three Australian ASR Sites in a Bayesian Context

Abstract

When evaluating uncertainties in developing an aquifer storage and recovery (ASR) system, under normal budgetary constraints, a systematic approach is needed to prioritise investigations. Three case studies where field trials have been undertaken, and clogging evaluated, reveal the changing perceptions of viability of ASR from a clogging perspective as a result of the progress of investigations. Two stormwater and one recycled water ASR investigations in siliceous aquifers are described that involved different strategies to evaluate the potential for clogging. This paper reviews these sites, as well as earlier case studies and information relating water quality, to clogging in column studies. Two novel theoretical concepts are introduced in the paper. Bayesian analysis is applied to demonstrate the increase in expected net benefit in developing a new ASR operation by undertaking clogging experiments (that have an assumed known reliability for predicting viability) for the injectant treatment options and aquifer material from the site. Results for an example situation demonstrate benefit cost ratios of experiments ranging from 1.5 to 6 and apply if decisions are based on experimental results whether success or failure are predicted. Additionally, a theoretical assessment of clogging rates characterised as acute and chronic is given, to explore their combined impact, for two operating parameters that define the onset of purging for recovery of reversible clogging and the onset of occasional advanced bore rehabilitation to address recovery of chronic clogging. These allow the assessment of net recharge and the proportion of water purged or redeveloped. Both analyses could inform economic decisions and help motivate an improved investigation methodology. It is expected that aquifer heterogeneity will result in differing injection rates among wells, so operational experience will ultimately be valuable in differentiating clogging behaviour under different aquifer conditions for the same water type. This paper was originally presented at ISMAR9, Mexico City 20-24 June 2016.

Water Quality Considerations on the Rise as the Use of Managed Aquifer Recharge Systems Widens

“…While surface water continues to be the main source water used in MAR (e.g., [7]), the use of other source water types such as desalinated seawater [2,19,20], treated waste water [20,21] and harvested rain water [5] and stormwater [22] is growing. Along with the variation of different source waters, the type and degree to which pretreatment is required to allow infiltration [22,23] are diverging as well.…”

“…Along with the variation of different source waters, the type and degree to which pretreatment is required to allow infiltration [22,23] are diverging as well. Pretreatment, e.g., by coagulation, sand filtration or soil aquifer treatment (SAT), is needed to remove suspended fines from the source water, in order to prevent infiltration well clogging (e.g., [24]) and to maximize the recharge capacity during surface infiltration [21,24,25].…”

Assessment of Managed Aquifer Recharge through Modeling—A Review

“…Risk assessment tools were used to evaluate the fate of possible organic contaminant hazards during ASR [31,[125][126][127][128][129][130]. Incorporation of biogeochemical reactions can help to quantify bacterial Quantifying the resulting groundwater levels and the spreading of injected water in the aquifer is a task often solved by groundwater flow modeling [7,55,[70][71][72][73][74].…”

“…Risk assessment tools were used to evaluate the fate of possible organic contaminant hazards during ASR [31,[125][126][127][128][129][130]. Incorporation of biogeochemical reactions can help to quantify bacterial influence on the local geochemistry [131,132] and show the removal efficiencies of organic contaminants during successive ASR cycles [133].…”

A risk assessment methodology to evaluate the risk failure of managed aquifer recharge in the Mediterranean Basin

“…Although some approaches to evaluate the risk of a MAR system have been developed (Assmuth et al, 2016;Ayuso-Gabella et al, 2011;Dillon et al, 2016;Lee, 2016, 2017;Juntunen et al, 2017;Page et al, 2010;Toze et al, 2010), comprehensive studies that integrate both nontechnical and technical factors are absent (Nandha et al, 2015). In this study, we (i) precisely present an integrated PRA-FT that is applicable for a general MAR facility and (ii) apply it to six different MAR facilities that were part of the EU FP7 project MARSOL, located in five different Mediterranean countries: Portugal (1), Spain (2), Italy (1), Malta (1), and Israel (1).…”